"Shopping 101"

Homily for the Third Sunday of Advent – 13 December 2015

The people asked John the Baptist, “Teacher, what should we do?”

                                                                                                    Luke 3:10

News flash. It’s not beginning to look a lot like Christmas. It started looking a lot like Christmas months ago. But you already knew that. And yet, given all that time, with stocking stuffers or a big ticket item or two left outstanding, you might be in the mood to sharpen your competitive purchasing skills with a free download of “Christmas Shopper Simulator.”

You people think I make this stuff up.

Think again, because you can go online and check it out for yourself. “Christmas Shopper Simulator” is billed as the “original, ground-breaking simulator that exactly replicates the eye-gouging panic and frustration of Christmas shopping.”

And who could turn down a pitch like this: “Generic human faces! Stores with queues and thieves! The color red! Accurately-textured ceiling tiles!”

What’s not to get your pulse racing? Unless we hit the “pause” button and ask, “Why is Christmas shopping such a big deal in the first place?” Or more to the point, “Why do we shop? Period.”

Social critic Jennifer Michael Hecht has some answers.

First, she cautions, there are a lot of opinions about shopping out there. Some think the buying frenzy ─ typified by Black Friday ─ is vulgar, especially while so many go hungry. Others counter with a bit of anxiety: We’re not shopping enough to fuel the recovering economy.

There’s obviously no consensus, then, on the phenomenon of shopping. So Hecht goes to the “why” of shopping. Specifically, real face-time, brave-the-hordes shopping. And not what I think is a god-send: online shopping.

We venture out of our homes to shop, Hecht says, because holiday shopping looks a lot like religious rituals in the past ─ rituals that got a lot of people with no obvious connection to one another … all together in one place … focused on roughly the same thing, whether it was appeasing God or the gods, celebrating the harvest, or renewing the community.

It’s a human thing. That’s because there’s a part of our humanity, Hecht suggests, that can be aroused only when we act in tandem with a big crowd engaged in keeping a tradition. Just look at Super Bowl Sunday … or the Esplanade on July 4 … or Black Friday. I mean, Black Friday has got to be about more than bargain-hunting with a side of masochism, no?

And that might explain why, year after year, we just keep jumping into the mêlée of Christmas shopping with both feet. It makes us part of something bigger than ourselves. And ─ whether it’s jostling with other sharp-elbowed shoppers at Walmart or breaking bread in the company of strangers in the food court at the mall ─ it creates a shared experience.

Self-disclosure: When it comes to shopping, my as-yet-to-be-published Costco Survival Guide advises, “Head down. Lower gaze.” Or, eyeball-engage with other shoppers? It’s the first step to unconditional surrender.

In the likely event you choose to ignore my curmudgeonly advice, you may discover ─ against all odds ─ shopping creates community.

And that, I think, is what John the Baptist is up to. All the shouting and the haranguing and the baptizing? It’s about creating community that looks a lot like holiday shopping ─ a specific kind of messy community that, against all odds, impacts the way we interact with all sorts of people … especially people common sense says we should have little or nothing to do with.

But if it’s a specific kind of community John is organizing, what sets it apart from others?

It’s a community that “bears good fruit ─ fruit worthy of repentance.” That’s how John the Baptist describes it.

Frankly, I don’t think you can hang much on that. And neither do the crowds hanging on John’s every word. So they demand, “Be more specific! What should we do?”

John obliges. He gives specifics ─ specifics that capture the real question he is putting to each and every person within earshot of his baiting voice: “What does your neighbor need?”

In other words, John says, if you have just enough clothing and more ─ beyond your needs … and more than enough food ─ beyond your needs ─ give to those who lack sufficient (read: warm) clothing. Give to those who lack sufficient food to sustain them on a daily basis (aka the “daily bread” we pray so much about).

Tax collectors ─ guilt written all over their faces ─ ask John the same question: “What should we do?” And again, he gets specific. Basically, “Place your appetites in stark relief to your neighbor’s unmet needs. Stick to the 1040 tax tables. And stop extorting extra revenue that makes you rich and richer by making your poor neighbor poorer.”

Soldiers ─ they’d be today’s police ─ then get in on the act. “What should we do?” John tells them to get beyond their own ego feed and biases. That is, stop being cops-gone-bad (like the Chicago officers in the Laquan MacDonald shooting-murder and subsequent cover-up). Stop extorting money ─ or “other favors” (like sex) ─ from innocent, otherwise law-abiding, or not-so-law-abiding, citizens.

John’s point? God is invested in a Holy People positioned to give the coming Messiah ─ who turns out to be Jesus ─ a running start in pulling off his creation-wide makeover. To give the Messiah a leg-up, John demands, “Ask not, ‘What are my wants?’ Ask, rather, ‘What are my neighbor’s needs?’”

John's bottomline: Against all odds, connect to people we have no obvious connection to, especially the people God is partial to. Hint: They’re not the One Percent.

Against all odds, share with them all we've got beyond our essential needs … so they can meet their essential needs.

Against all odds, keep your cotton-pickin’ hands off what’s not yours … because God insists that essentials ─ like food, heat, clothing, affordable housing, healthcare, education, a decent wage, violence-free neighborhoods, gun-free public spaces, especially schools ─ are everyone’s right.

Interesting experiment, then, for these waning days of Advent: What do all those people on your Christmas shopping list need?

Now, you can push back and say, “Giving people on my list what they want will make them happy … and the kids docile.”

Behavioral scientist Daniel Goleman begs to differ. His research shows, “Once people leave poverty and are able to satisfy their basic needs, there is little-to-no correlation between earnings [or other compensation, like gifts] and happiness.”

Sounds like he’s channeling Teresa of Ávila. “Our body,” she said, “has this defect: the more it is provided care and comforts, the more needs and desires it finds.”

What, then, should we do?

Look at the people on your shopping list … over the age of 8, lest the pre-reformed Grinch rear his ugly head. Would it be a crime against Christmas not to give everyone on your list what they want … but to give to a needs-based cause in their name?

Examples: High-impact, direct-care agencies like Heifer International … Episcopal Relief and Development … Housing Families … shelters for abused women … Planned Parenthood … the Human Rights Campaign … Nets for Life. (Note: Nets for Life combats the spread of malaria by distributing something as simple ─ and effective ─ as mosquito-inhibiting nets to protect the sleeping areas of our far-off neighbors.)

And there are so many other causes. The list seems endless … because there seems to be no end to the need.

But John the Baptist couldn’t be clearer. Community ─ a truly Holy People preparing for the Advent of Christ ─ created by more and more of us giving to satisfy the needs of more and more of our neighbors ─ is the answer ─ the only answer to the question: “What should we do?”

Amen.